"Granted that disorder spoils pattern, it also provides
the material of pattern. Order implies restriction; from all possible materials, a limited selection has been made
and from all possible relations a limited set has been used. So disorder by implication is unlimited, no pattern
has been realised in it, but its potential for patterning is indefinite. This is why, though we seek to create
order, we do not simply condemn disorder. We recognise that it is destructive to existing patterns; also that it
has potentiality. It symbolises both danger and power" (Douglas, Purity and Danger, 95).

The above quote suggests that disorder within
a system can be a symbol or a tool for both danger and power. Within the laws
of halakhah are important laws regarding the period of menstruation.
In many of the laws, menstruating women represent disorder within the system.
During the period of niddahmen and women must follow certain purity laws. At the
time of menstruation, women are considered marginal. There is no sex allowed
during menstruation and Orthodox Jews have broadened the laws to forbid women
to touch their husbands or sleep in the same bed with him. Some laws also say
that contact with a menstruating women, including the husband's food touched
by her, is polluting. These laws marginalize women during the period of menstruation
and therefore put them both in a position of power and danger. Douglas states
once again:

"To have been in the margins is to have been in contact
with danger, to have been at a source of power. It is consistent with the ideas about form and formlessness to
treat initiands coming out of seclusion as if they were themselves charged with power, hot dangerous, requiring
insulation and a time for cooling down" (Douglas, 98).

According to Douglas, the body is a metaphor for social structure and the restrictions
placed on the body, specifically purity laws, symbolize the same laws used by society. Women are marginalized by
their exclusion or difference in daily life while they are menstruating but does this also give them a role of
power? Some women, such as the Orthodox feminist writer Blu Greenberg, argue that niddah laws give women
a power separate from men. Greenberg says that niddah laws were designed to safeguard women from becoming
sex objects and to renew sexual relations within a marriage. The mikveh (ritual bath) is not just
a symbol of purification but also of renewal, recreation and regeneration of life forces. Some literature written
on niddah stresses defilement, punishment and danger but other literature highlights marital love, respect
and the holiness of sex. According to Greenberg, niddah is not widely practiced because it's difficult to
keep; people mistake it as only a hygiene ritual and concentrate on the sexual prohibitions. She believes that
women (and men) can find renewal in marriage as well as a powerful sense of their sexuality through niddah and
mikveh. She proposes six ways the community can re-imagine niddah and mikveh:

1) re-educate the community on women's mitzvoth
(religious commandments) that already exist

2) change language to de-emphasize terror

3) incorporate women's health benefits such as
breast exams

4) reconsider the number of days for abstinence

5) reconsider abstinence at the beginning of
marriage

6) reconsider allowed bodily contact to allow
more affection

Greenberg believes that rituals of niddah and mikveh also help
Jewish women gain a higher level of consciousness and identify with other Jewish women past and present. These
mitzvoth allow her to feel like a link in the chain of Jewish women.

"As I go about my business at the mikveh, I often savor
the knowledge that I am doing exactly as Jewish women have done for twenty or thirty centuries. It is a matter
not only of keeping the chain going, but also one of self-definition: this is how my forebears defined themselves
as Jewish women and as part of the community and this is how I define myself. It is the sense of community with
them that pleases me. There is yet another aspect to observing a mitzvah for its own sake. The laws of niddah continually
remind me that I am a Jew and niddah reinforces that deep inner contentment with a Jewish way of life" (Greenberg,
119).

Although Greenberg views niddah and mikveh as important mitzvoth
which greatly benefit women, do women become less powerful once they reach menopause? After menopause women no
longer visit the mikveh and therefore lose their monthly ritualized rejuvenation. Rituals of abstinence
disappear between husband and wife. If the mikveh rejuvenates sexual relations between them, the loss of
the ritual could, in theory, change sexual relations between partners. Greenberg also questions this by saying
"One must wonder whether a woman who has faithfully observed mikveh throughout her life feels a heightened
sense of loss at menopause" (Greenberg, 119). In a sense, women's marginality gave them a sense of power by
following the purity ritual. Once women reach menopause they are no longer "dangerous" to men and would
therefore lose power according to Douglas' theory.